The U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) is entering into a partnership with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) as part of GSA’s Centers of Excellence (CoE) initiative, housed within GSA's Technology Transformation Services (TTS) office, the agency announced on Thursday.
“The Centers of Excellence is partnering with the FDA to support its IT community and accelerate the modernization of core capabilities,” said TTS director Anil Cheriyan. “We’re bringing the best talent from within the federal government and the private sector together to collaborate and drive the next generation of customer-centric results at OIMT.”
Under the people-centered partnership, the CoE and FDA’s Office of Information Management and Technology (OIMT) will strengthen its employee engagement to drive the FDA’s technology modernization efforts. The initiative will support the workforce’s adoption and delivery of new technologies and processes to directly assist the FDA’s broad regulatory responsibilities.
GSA’s CoE, within the agency’s Federal Acquisition Service (FAS), will accelerate IT modernization at federal agencies by leveraging private sector innovation and government services while centralizing best practices and expertise for holistic transformation.
TTS helps agencies make their services more accessible, efficient, and effective with modern applications, platforms, processes, personnel and software solutions. The FDA is the latest agency to partner with GSA and apply the CoE approach to modernization.
Within the CoE, the GSA has partnered with the Department of Agriculture, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Office of Personnel Management, the Consumer Product Safety Commission and the Department of Defense’s Joint Artificial Intelligence Center (JAIC), among many others.
“The FDA’s OIMT is responsible for the technical infrastructure of the agency,” said FDA Chief Technology Officer Vid Desai. “OIMT enables us to support public health by providing critical technology to all of our offices and centers. When we put our workforce first we know they’ll be better equipped to meet the challenges of the FDA’s diverse mission by enabling a modern organization, strategies, and infrastructure.”
The GSA CoE’s partnership with JAIC announced new innovations to leverage data as a strategic asset and advance AI across the DoD, through the Centers of Excellence (CoE) collaboration in Feb. 2020.
This next step paves the way for the DoD to improve how we manage and leverage data as a strategic asset," said Lt. Gen. Jack Shanahan, director of the Joint Artificial Intelligence Center and 2020 Wash100 Award recipient. "We appreciate the CoE's commitment to creating a collaborative environment that enables solutions for broader AI governance, technology acquisition strategies, and scaling AI solutions through the Joint Common Foundation."
JAIC stakeholders and CoE members have engaged in a series of human-centered design workshops to determine essential roles and responsibilities for managing data assets. The determination will shape a flexible governance framework to manage data holdings, including cybersecurity, healthcare, predictive maintenance and business automation.
Through implementing governance tailored specifically to AI initiatives, the partnership has created an innovative AI stance. The system integrates flexibility and interoperability of an enterprise-wide Joint Common Foundation expedite AI capabilities.
About GSA
The mission of the U.S. General Services Administration is to deliver value and savings in real estate, acquisition, technology, and other mission-support services across the government. One of GSA’s four strategic goals is to improve the way agencies buy, build and use technology.
